Case Study

Title:

Title:

Tents & Camera Rigs

Commercial

Commercial

Commercial

Cinematographer

Ryan Spacone

Lighting

Lighting

Lighting

Camera Rigging

Camera Rigging

Camera Rigging

On set

On set

On set

Overview


Industry:

Live Event

Location:

Los Angeles

Grip Package:

Legacy Grip 5 Ton

Shoot Days:

2

Key Grip

Brendan Riel

the crew

Gaffer:

Thomas Sigurdsson

Best Boy Grip:

Connor Colby

Grips:

Nick Zajic, Vic Roca, Jordan Hodges, DJ Meyer

Day 1

This was a 2 day spot for a live event company. We scouted a few days before the shoot and felt pretty good coming into it. We shot 3 different spots in 2 days.

Day 1 we shot in a restaurant. Our main artist talent for the day was only going to be with us for 45 minutes max when she showed up. We had 2 hours to set up and then we shot her out. We shot with our other talent the rest of the day and wrapped after 10 hours. Since we were shooting in an active restaurant we kept all our lighting on the ground. For our key light we employed the use of a Matthew max menace arm. We went for a stage lighting look and rigged some movers to 2x 10' sticks of black 12" box truss on base plates. Electricians brought in 2 more par trees with some additional small moving lights. All 4 of those blended into the background nicely. The rest of the day involved moving around the max menace arm and employing some ground units with 4x diffusion.


Restaurant BTS

Setup Overview

The Tent

We came in on the day and constructed our tent on location. We set it up in roughly 45 minutes and took it down in 30. Speedrail skeleton, solids over the whole thing and day blue muz in the interior.

The Tent

We came in on the day and constructed our tent on location. We set it up in roughly 45 minutes and took it down in 30. Speedrail skeleton, solids over the whole thing and day blue muz in the interior.

The Tent

We came in on the day and constructed our tent on location. We set it up in roughly 45 minutes and took it down in 30. Speedrail skeleton, solids over the whole thing and day blue muz in the interior.

The Living Room

Living room location with the exterior tent was a fun one to light. We set some points for set lighting, controlled some ambiance with some big solids, and tented outside the windows.

The Living Room

Living room location with the exterior tent was a fun one to light. We set some points for set lighting, controlled some ambiance with some big solids, and tented outside the windows.

The Living Room

Living room location with the exterior tent was a fun one to light. We set some points for set lighting, controlled some ambiance with some big solids, and tented outside the windows.

Dolly Offset Rig

This rig works perfectly for when you need to push / pull from a car window or through the windshield. We had originally planned to pull the windshield here but worked nonetheless for us to climb up the grill and over the hood.

Dolly Offset Rig

This rig works perfectly for when you need to push / pull from a car window or through the windshield. We had originally planned to pull the windshield here but worked nonetheless for us to climb up the grill and over the hood.

Dolly Offset Rig

This rig works perfectly for when you need to push / pull from a car window or through the windshield. We had originally planned to pull the windshield here but worked nonetheless for us to climb up the grill and over the hood.

Day 2

Day 2 we shot in the showroom area of a prop house and an empty parking lot.

We had a lot more flexibility with talent on this day. Our bedroom set was constructed in the showroom area. We looked in 3 different directions. Art set up a flat on one end to hide a roll up door and to shrink the size of the room. The back wall of the set was the real building wall and was covered with large windows that looked out to the street. We ended up tenting the whole wall from the outside to maintain consistency with our daylight look and provide control for our in camera change from daylight to party mode.

The exterior tent was 27' wide, 8' deep and 11' tall. We constructed the skeleton out of speedrail. On the feet I like to use over unders so we can adjust the height of various verticals. This is helpful when your area isn't perfectly flat. It also helps to achieve heights that vary from our standard speedrail lengths of 8', 10', 12', 14', etc.

Our methodology for tenting is to usually build the skeleton, then tie our wall solids on all the way around. If we are worried about seeing the speedrail up top then we'll speed clip the rag to hide the pipe. After the sides are on all the way around we will drape the top solid over the top and speed clip that on as well.

In this specific instance we lined the interior with day blue muslin so we would get a sky-like ambiance from the inside. We frosted the windows from the outside with hampshire and curtains helped blend the outside muslin.

Our interior lighting consisted of a few overhead lights rigged to the warehouse beams, a max menace with a litemat and some floor units that floated around. We brought in a couple of 12x20 solids rigged in the vertical orientation to kill some daylight spill from window lights behind camera. This spot was all about controlling the environment.


After we shot out the warehouse we moved to the parking lot. Electricians set up some area lights to light the space. We set up a 12x12 bounce and shaped it with a bottomer and sider. We had some additional ground units some of which we diffused with some 4x frames and shaped them up with flags.

We rocked the fisher model 10 with an underslung 4' slider which provided the platform for a lot of our camera movement. For our specialty shot we employed the use of Modulus-X truss to create a dolly offset. This allowed us to push up and over the hood up to the windshield. They had originally planned on removing the windshield so we could push camera into the car but this was scrapped last minute.

Interior tent with day blue muslin

Interior tent with day blue muslin

Interior tent with day blue muslin

Our interior lighting and exterior tent result

Our interior lighting and exterior tent result

Our interior lighting and exterior tent result

Modulus-X camera offset

Modulus-X camera offset

Modulus-X camera offset

12x12 bounce shaped with solids

12x12 bounce shaped with solids

12x12 bounce shaped with solids

On set mvp

Nick is a key player on any shoot he's on. He thrives behind the dolly and understands camera movement. He collaborates effortlessly with his camera operators to execute the vision with ease. Who's that creepy guy behind him though?

Gear Used the Most

Gear Used the Most

4x4 diffusion frames

4x4 diffusion frames

4x4 diffusion frames

Matthews max menace

Matthews max menace

Matthews max menace

American stands

American stands

American stands

Regular Solids

Regular Solids

Regular Solids

Specialty gear

Modparts

Modparts

Modparts

Modulus-X™

Modulus-X™

Modulus-X™

built with

LA Rag House

LA Rag House

LA Rag House

Modulus-X™

Modulus-X™

Modulus-X™

Matthews Grip Equipment

Matthews Grip Equipment

Matthews Grip Equipment

American Grip

American Grip

American Grip

by:

Brendan Riel

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rig breakdown

20x20 Flyswatter

by:

Brendan Riel

My standard swatter built. Triangle truss with 1 steel. 8’ verticals for the goalpost with a 5’ horizontal. Wigs from the bucket to the tri truss. Kickers on the goalpost. 20’ kickers from the goalpost to the 20x20 frame. 2x belly lines to finish it off.

rig breakdown

20x20 Flyswatter

by:

Brendan Riel

My standard swatter built. Triangle truss with 1 steel. 8’ verticals for the goalpost with a 5’ horizontal. Wigs from the bucket to the tri truss. Kickers on the goalpost. 20’ kickers from the goalpost to the 20x20 frame. 2x belly lines to finish it off.

rig breakdown

20x20 Flyswatter

by:

Brendan Riel

My standard swatter built. Triangle truss with 1 steel. 8’ verticals for the goalpost with a 5’ horizontal. Wigs from the bucket to the tri truss. Kickers on the goalpost. 20’ kickers from the goalpost to the 20x20 frame. 2x belly lines to finish it off.

rig breakdown

ModX Rolling Soft Toplight

by:

Brendan Riel

We built this mobile toplight softbox using 6" ModX truss to serve four different sets inside a tight studio space with limited overhead clearance. The goal was to keep costs down and avoid building duplicate overhead rigs or ground units for each set. So, we designed a rolling, double-layered softbox that could easily move from set to set—and double as an in-frame ceiling piece when needed.

The structure measured 14’x14’ OD and held two 12x12 frames: one with 1/2 grid and one with bleached muslin. The bleached muz was rigged with a pulley system, allowing us to raise or drop the rag when we needed to bring it into the scene as a ceiling element. We punched LiteTile through both rags for soft, consistent coverage.

For mobility, we mounted the whole rig on C&C Studio Services tri-casters.

rig breakdown

ModX Rolling Soft Toplight

by:

Brendan Riel

We built this mobile toplight softbox using 6" ModX truss to serve four different sets inside a tight studio space with limited overhead clearance. The goal was to keep costs down and avoid building duplicate overhead rigs or ground units for each set. So, we designed a rolling, double-layered softbox that could easily move from set to set—and double as an in-frame ceiling piece when needed.

The structure measured 14’x14’ OD and held two 12x12 frames: one with 1/2 grid and one with bleached muslin. The bleached muz was rigged with a pulley system, allowing us to raise or drop the rag when we needed to bring it into the scene as a ceiling element. We punched LiteTile through both rags for soft, consistent coverage.

For mobility, we mounted the whole rig on C&C Studio Services tri-casters.

rig breakdown

ModX Rolling Soft Toplight

by:

Brendan Riel

We built this mobile toplight softbox using 6" ModX truss to serve four different sets inside a tight studio space with limited overhead clearance. The goal was to keep costs down and avoid building duplicate overhead rigs or ground units for each set. So, we designed a rolling, double-layered softbox that could easily move from set to set—and double as an in-frame ceiling piece when needed.

The structure measured 14’x14’ OD and held two 12x12 frames: one with 1/2 grid and one with bleached muslin. The bleached muz was rigged with a pulley system, allowing us to raise or drop the rag when we needed to bring it into the scene as a ceiling element. We punched LiteTile through both rags for soft, consistent coverage.

For mobility, we mounted the whole rig on C&C Studio Services tri-casters.

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Website Links

Upcoming

Shows

coming soon

Shop

coming soon

Podcast

coming soon

community

coming soon

Join our newsletter & stay up to date

By subscribing you agree to with our privacy policy and provide consent to receive updates from our company.

Legacy Grip 2025 All Rights Reserved

Consent Preferences